


Fourth of July

by mythstake



Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Frigga (Marvel) Feels, Gen, Loki (Marvel) Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-09 05:19:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17995634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mythstake/pseuds/mythstake
Summary: Shall we look at the moon, my little loon?Why do you cry?





	Fourth of July

" _Loki_ ," the queen sighed out with enough joy to send an ache through his chest and pricks of hot tears to his eyes. The chains at his wrists fell away with an echoed clang as a nameless guard gently urged the prince forward into the large room.

This was unlike most of his previous interactions with the palace fodder; of sneers and bared teeth. Things were quieter, now that it seemed as though the kingdom was already in a state of mourning, even as the Allmother still breathed. Barely breathed.

 For such a powerful woman, Frigga more closely resembled a porcelain doll in her golden chamber bed. All wrapped up in silken sheets with her grievous wound hidden and tucked away; a family secret in a locked off drawer. It was at her request that her cuckoo son was brought from his prison cell, and it was one the Allfather could not refuse her. After all, Thor and his father had already taken their fill of the limited time that their mother still had. Fitting, then, that Loki would have the scraps of time no one else wants. When the light fades from triumphant eyes and the color bleeds out into the pastel blues of a corpse; when the monotony of dying slow is less about grace and more about getting the ordeal over with already.

 The prince's face twitched to remain stony before the guards, one glancing towards the other in silent question, left the mother to her son. Her rightful son. It was not until the heavy gilded doors slammed closed that Loki let the emotions on his angled face fall as tears poured from the reddened rims of his eyes. The Allmother simply smiled, almost knowingly. But didn't she always know?

 "Come here my little turtledove." A weak beckoning with a trembling hand with a name he had not heard since he was a child was all it took for the godling's long legs to finally listen to reason, bringing him closer in stilted strides; a marionette on strings. It was strange, this grief. So strong it settles into one's bones, turning them to stone. Everything felt heavier in the face of certain death; a gravity too strong to pull away from. Inevitably he'll come crashing down with it.

 Sliding down onto his knees into a familiar spot next to her bed, Loki took her pale hand into his. It was difficult to find his voice as he sobbed silently against their joined fingers like a child with shoulders that shook from the effort of keeping everything _in_. Frigga sucked against her teeth in a tut as she moved with no small amount of effort towards the edge of her bed. If it hurt, she made no indication of it. Typical of the queen, even now as she teetered on oblivion.

 "Your hair is a mess," she sighed out before tracing a fingernail along her son's hairline, tucking the black sheep's tresses behind his ear. The normalcy of a mother's fretting was the anchor he needed to finally blink back the tears that still clung to his lashes, ending his emotional bout with a pathetic sniffle.

"I've tried for centuries to straighten this curl." Frigga wound the particularly stubborn ringlet around a thin finger to stroke against her thumb affectionately. Loki simply smiled with a press of thin lips against the hand still in his.

"Liar. You've always loved it." he tipped his forehead to press their hands against the bridge of his nose to will his voice to stop its quivering. It was true, though. A secret in-joke the two shared about the lock of hair that just would not behave. The queen had always threatened to lop it off, but she didn't have the heart to. Suited him too well in a realm that seemed too ill-suited for the young prince.

 The thought brought a nostalgic smile back to his mother's face. What have the years done to you, my sweet boy? What will they do? The godling had begun his subtle trek closer towards the bed, now. Closer and closer until he was perched halfway against his mother's side, careful not to press against her bandaging. It was telling, the absence of healers at her side. No longer was it a question of saving her life, nor prolonging it. Now it was a measure of pain management and damage control for the inevitable.

 With a scoot down Loki nestled down against her pillow, leaving all manners of hot tears against the fabric.

"My sweet Loki." she hummed wearily as she cupped the hollow of a cheek in her hand. The light from a fading sun shone in and captured the glint of dust rising and falling in unseen air currents. It was all that moved in the stillness. Despite the circumstances, Loki felt no rush in babbling out words and so, it seemed, neither did the Allmother. Both were content to search the other's features for hidden messages. Codes they've learned over the centuries; a roll of the eyes, a lock of the jaw. Most of Loki's own tics had roots in hers and it was evidence of a strong, solid bond that neither death nor lack of relation could break. Odin was not his father. Thor was not his brother. But Frigga? Frigga was his mother, and everyone knew it.

 Loki leaned into her touch self-indulgently as he ignored how cold, how dead, her skin already felt. It wouldn't be long now.

 "I'm sorry," 'For everything.' 'For not being there to save you.' "—I did not mean what I said."

"I know." Didn't she always know? Her thumb brushed over the sharp jut of his cheekbone.

"I have a favor to ask of you." she murmured with a slow, drooping blink. It won't be long now.

"Anything. You need only ask."

 _I would move the heavens and bend Yggdrasil over backwards for you, I swear it_ , he thinks.

"Forgive your brother for our misgivings. He misses you, and he'll need your guidance."

 _I know_ , she hides her reply in a smile.

The mad prince sighed tiredly, tear-stained cheeks still wet to the touch.

"Of course I will." _The last lie he'd tell his mother,_ he tells himself. But the old goddess knows better. Sees the truth in the slump of his broad shoulders that even he cannot hide.

 _After she's gone they will have to find comfort in the other_ , she tells herself. Ironic that she will do in death what she had always longed to do in life.

Frigga so adored her ironies.

 The two stayed there in the quiet of companionable silence until one, or the other, fell asleep first.

* * *

 

  Loki woke with a start from a noise just outside the door in the hall. Blinking, he tried to adjust his eyes to the darkness. Night had fallen in the hours they had slept, leaving the only two light sources: the cracks in the giant doors and the silvery moonlight from the wide balcony. It was enough to see Frigga's peaceful smile through the veil of black that clung to their forms. Enough to see that her eyes were closed in a truly restful sleep. Enough, he ignores, to see that the uneasy rise and fall of her chest had stopped sometime in the night.

With a cold hand, he gripped her colder one at his cheek to join its twin. As if it were always there, a particularly stubborn lock of black hair now sat solemnly in slowly stiffening fingers.

With her hands now folded properly beside her head, the prince brushed away the golden strands that clung to her forehead to press a trembling kiss against it.

"I will see you again, mother." he promises quiet, again, before slipping off the cool bed to walk quietly towards the door.

Back towards his imprisonment.

He tells the guards waiting outside not to wake her until morning.

**Author's Note:**

> oops


End file.
